International Steampunk

The Victorian era was the time when the sun never set on the British Empire, and for a time a quarter of the world’s population were British subjects, under British law. As well, Britain had a controlling economic interest in countries like China, and spent a lot of its time interfering with the government of these ‘allied’ states. Britain almost smothered the world with its culture and values, it fashions and traditions. Britannia rules the waves, and the land, the fashions, the customs and all.

Even in the most tropical climates, it was considered ‘letting the side down’ to dress in the cooler native fashions, and so the only ‘proper’ clothing was appropriate to the environs of chilly England. Imagine wearing five or six layers of clothing in the sweltering summer of Australia, Hong Kong, or India. Nor would the British adapt their lifestyle to a different culture or climate. Noel Coward parodied the…